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What's your total backup solution?
- Thread starter Illegit
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I use Carbon Copy Cloner for backing up my boot camp partition. I partitioned an external drive, and have one partition for a mac clone, and the other for a windows clone. then I also have another external partitioned for time machine and for use as a scratch disk
One computer: late 2008 15" MBP with 320GB drive
HOME
1) Time Machine to a dedicated 1TB WD drive in a Nexstar FW800 enclosure
2) Daily (1am) SuperDuper backup to a "Daily" partition on WD 750GB drive in a Macpower enclosure
3) Weekly (2am, Saturday) SuperDuper backup to a "Weekly" partition on the same WD 750GB drive in the Macpower enclosure
OFFICE
1) Daily (whenever I get in) SuperDuper backup to a 250GB USB drive in a Nexstar enclosure
PLUS
- always connected: hourly backup using ChronoSync of mission critical data to a 160GB Lacie Rugged drive.
- Daily backup of system settings using "Backup" app @ 2am to MobileMe
HOME
1) Time Machine to a dedicated 1TB WD drive in a Nexstar FW800 enclosure
2) Daily (1am) SuperDuper backup to a "Daily" partition on WD 750GB drive in a Macpower enclosure
3) Weekly (2am, Saturday) SuperDuper backup to a "Weekly" partition on the same WD 750GB drive in the Macpower enclosure
OFFICE
1) Daily (whenever I get in) SuperDuper backup to a 250GB USB drive in a Nexstar enclosure
PLUS
- always connected: hourly backup using ChronoSync of mission critical data to a 160GB Lacie Rugged drive.
- Daily backup of system settings using "Backup" app @ 2am to MobileMe
TM and Mozy
Hey...I use Time Machine and Mozy. I have a Mac Pro and a MacBook Pro that both backup to separate external hard drives. I also have 2 subscriptions of Mozy (only $110/yr. for unlimited data). Mozy backs up the data that is contained w/in my computer, as well as, backs up the Time Machine back ups.
Redundant, I know. But it is worth it.
Cheers,
-RenorN
Hey...I use Time Machine and Mozy. I have a Mac Pro and a MacBook Pro that both backup to separate external hard drives. I also have 2 subscriptions of Mozy (only $110/yr. for unlimited data). Mozy backs up the data that is contained w/in my computer, as well as, backs up the Time Machine back ups.
Redundant, I know. But it is worth it.
Cheers,
-RenorN
I have been using Mozy for my MBP backing up >2Gb of data to a free account. I was thinging of getting a full account for my Mac Pro with 90GB of photos. Do you have experience with backing a large amount of data on line. I was very curious how long the first backup will take?
How do you do this? CCC's FAQ says "backing up non-HFS+-formatted volumes is not currently supported."
Flash drives, CDs, DVDs and an external hard drive + a few web uploads to various places (Yahoo Mail, MegaUpload..). I prefer CDs and DVDs.
Sorry, I forgot to mention all of the drag-and-dropping I do from Windows onto the Mac partition before using CCC to backup my Windows data... not a full clone I might add
this looks fun...my turn!
the manual backup is ok because this data literally never changes. Whenever I slate data from my computer as "old," I copy it to both locations at the same time. Frankly, I don't know why I even keep it. I guess i'm a bit of a pack rat.
if I could get my hands on a spare internal hard disk, I'd use CCC or something to make a bootable clone every few weeks and store it off site. Too bad I have many more things on my shopping list before another HDD
the manual backup is ok because this data literally never changes. Whenever I slate data from my computer as "old," I copy it to both locations at the same time. Frankly, I don't know why I even keep it. I guess i'm a bit of a pack rat.
if I could get my hands on a spare internal hard disk, I'd use CCC or something to make a bootable clone every few weeks and store it off site. Too bad I have many more things on my shopping list before another HDD
Attachments
So is there a way to make a bootable backup of Windows that is a BootCamp partition? If not, how do you protect Windows against drive failure? A lot of my work critical data is within Windows and I really want to have a good backup of it.
I use winclone it works great.
The main site is down right now but just google winclone to get it.
TM to external hard drive (usually reaches back two or three month).
Sync of some important folders to MobileMe every night, using the rsync command.
Deja Vu to second external hard drive every month.
Manual copy of the most important stuff to third external hd every few month, stored at my office, just in case.
Sync of some important folders to MobileMe every night, using the rsync command.
Deja Vu to second external hard drive every month.
Manual copy of the most important stuff to third external hd every few month, stored at my office, just in case.
At home, I simply back up to a 1TB Time Capsule. The Time Capsule is secured to the radiator with a kensington lock (the hope being that although someone might steal my MacBook Pro, they'll not bother with the TC... when will Apple introduce find my MacBook with remote wipe for MobileMe users?). So long as there isn't a fire
A handful of files are also duplicated on my iDisk.
At work, I just pray. No-one's seen fit to purchase a backup solution for our edit rigs so we have a few terabytes of unbacked-up data.
A handful of files are also duplicated on my iDisk.
At work, I just pray. No-one's seen fit to purchase a backup solution for our edit rigs so we have a few terabytes of unbacked-up data.
I have a MBP and a G-Drive Mini (for photos / downloads). My backup strategy includes the following:
1. Time Machine - onto a 1 TB G-Drive Q (stays at home).
2. SuperDuper / ChronSync - onto a 750 GB G-Drive Q that travels with me.
This Q drive has two partitions - the first partition has a SuperDuper clone of my MBP internal drive. The second partition is a backup of the G-Drive mini. I use ChronoSync to synchronize all my Mini drive files with the second partition of the Q drive, and key folders (documents, etc) from my internal drive with the clone partition of the Q.
3. Mozy.com - all documents, photos, downloads, and other data.
1. Time Machine - onto a 1 TB G-Drive Q (stays at home).
2. SuperDuper / ChronSync - onto a 750 GB G-Drive Q that travels with me.
This Q drive has two partitions - the first partition has a SuperDuper clone of my MBP internal drive. The second partition is a backup of the G-Drive mini. I use ChronoSync to synchronize all my Mini drive files with the second partition of the Q drive, and key folders (documents, etc) from my internal drive with the clone partition of the Q.
3. Mozy.com - all documents, photos, downloads, and other data.
Not pointing out to be annoying.. have another look at the title on your document. (It would niggle me if I didn't tell youThis is an overview of my backup solution. I use a combination of Time Machine, Carbon Copy and Super Duper. All the traffic goes through my Mac Mini server. From that point there are several backup routes
to much time spent checking work for typos )
Not pointing out to be annoying.. have another look at the title on your document. (It would niggle me if I didn't tell you
Maybe not enough time.
I keep recent copies of critical files on two separate USB flash drives. One is always kept offsite. This is updated at least once a week. It is slow going backing up to them, I usually just copy the data when I am done for the day.
I also have two external drives. One is a 2 x 1 TB Raid 1 array that gets backed up with time machine daily. The other is an old 120 gb laptop hd in a firewire case that gets copies of the critical files, source code, etc. backed up.
I foolishly trusted Mozy
For a year I backed up to Mozy, even going from one OS to another, one machine to another. I tested it every once in a while by retrieving a few files, and it worked. Then the hard disk died, and I went confidently to Mozy for a backup when I got my new hard disk. After all, I had backed up just 20 minutes before the crash!
And most of it was not there.
So I contacted Mozy. I did all the online chat stuff with the folks in various parts of the world, but they could not help. So I escalated. I'm pretty good at this tracking people down, and actually got the phone number of the US-based "super help" backup. I spent HOURS on the phone over two weeks watching their top Mac guy manipulate my computer and the Mozy downloads -- evenings, weekends, even during my workweek.
Nada. They could not make the recovery work. The Mozy software had some insurmountable errors in it.
So I took the hard disk to a disk recovery service, and for under $600 I got all my data back (except Quicken data, which, it turns out, is hidden and old and unusable by the new software... but that's another story). So now I am using Carbonite. And an external hard drive.
Just a cautionary tale from one Mozy user.
For a year I backed up to Mozy, even going from one OS to another, one machine to another. I tested it every once in a while by retrieving a few files, and it worked. Then the hard disk died, and I went confidently to Mozy for a backup when I got my new hard disk. After all, I had backed up just 20 minutes before the crash!
And most of it was not there.
So I contacted Mozy. I did all the online chat stuff with the folks in various parts of the world, but they could not help. So I escalated. I'm pretty good at this tracking people down, and actually got the phone number of the US-based "super help" backup. I spent HOURS on the phone over two weeks watching their top Mac guy manipulate my computer and the Mozy downloads -- evenings, weekends, even during my workweek.
Nada. They could not make the recovery work. The Mozy software had some insurmountable errors in it.
So I took the hard disk to a disk recovery service, and for under $600 I got all my data back (except Quicken data, which, it turns out, is hidden and old and unusable by the new software... but that's another story). So now I am using Carbonite. And an external hard drive.
Just a cautionary tale from one Mozy user.
I use an automated backup solution with multiple stages.
Stage 1
Macbook & Macbook Pro are both configured to utilize TimeMachine to an Airport Extreme using a 1.5TB USB drive. TimeMachine volume is not backed up on a regular basis (basically only when I upgrade drives, I keep the old ones off-site for about a month before re-purposing them).
Stage 2
Macbook & Macbook Pro are both configured to rsync to my local NAS (a 15 drive RAIDZ2 Solaris system). rsync is run every hour (on the 1/2's) and keeps incremental backups for a period of 1 month.
Solaris system also utilizes rsync and sends a copy of the rsync destination (and a bunch of other stuff) every hour on the hour to 3 off-site locations (closest is 20 miles away, furthest is 140 miles away). Incremental backups are kept at these locations for 6 months. All 3 locations are enterprise hosting centers and each destination system utilizes RAID10 on enterprise hardware. The destination systems also include their own off-site backups as well as local NAS/tape backup solutions.
Stage 3
I test, yep fully test, my backup solutions. I do this about once a month and restore my systems fully to an external USB drive. I also have a collection of scripts that will run a consistency check on all of my rsync data that is run daily and sends me a report if any inconsistencies are found.
Needless to say, my laptops are somewhat disposable. There isn't any data on either one of them that I wouldn't be able to replace if I had to (important/sensitive data is all kept encrypted). Sure, there is a small timing issue (I could lose something that I was working on between backups) but that's not easily avoided, especially when considering battery life, bandwidth, performance, etc...
Using this backup solution, I've yet to... Well, I'll leave it at that, let's not tempt Murphy.
Stage 1
Macbook & Macbook Pro are both configured to utilize TimeMachine to an Airport Extreme using a 1.5TB USB drive. TimeMachine volume is not backed up on a regular basis (basically only when I upgrade drives, I keep the old ones off-site for about a month before re-purposing them).
Stage 2
Macbook & Macbook Pro are both configured to rsync to my local NAS (a 15 drive RAIDZ2 Solaris system). rsync is run every hour (on the 1/2's) and keeps incremental backups for a period of 1 month.
Solaris system also utilizes rsync and sends a copy of the rsync destination (and a bunch of other stuff) every hour on the hour to 3 off-site locations (closest is 20 miles away, furthest is 140 miles away). Incremental backups are kept at these locations for 6 months. All 3 locations are enterprise hosting centers and each destination system utilizes RAID10 on enterprise hardware. The destination systems also include their own off-site backups as well as local NAS/tape backup solutions.
Stage 3
I test, yep fully test, my backup solutions. I do this about once a month and restore my systems fully to an external USB drive. I also have a collection of scripts that will run a consistency check on all of my rsync data that is run daily and sends me a report if any inconsistencies are found.
Needless to say, my laptops are somewhat disposable. There isn't any data on either one of them that I wouldn't be able to replace if I had to (important/sensitive data is all kept encrypted). Sure, there is a small timing issue (I could lose something that I was working on between backups) but that's not easily avoided, especially when considering battery life, bandwidth, performance, etc...
Using this backup solution, I've yet to... Well, I'll leave it at that, let's not tempt Murphy.